Team Look Research Articles

Bullying of children with special needs in mainstream schools

In Vol. 7 No. 1 of Support for Learning we reported the initial findings of research into bullying conducted by Peter Smith and his colleagues at Sheffield University. Now, two years on, the team look at the incidence of bullying among children with special needs in mainstream schools. Their research concludes that statemented pupils, on the whole, are more likely to be victimised. General intervention strategies initiated by schools are effective in reducing bullying in this group without the need for specific targeting. We are, nevertheless, left with the worrying thought that this may not be necessarily true for the large number of pupils without statements who suffer some form of learning disability.

QI team shares ownership and gets results.

The FOCUS-PDCA framework for process improvement developed by the Hospital Corporation of America helps the healthcare team look at work as a series of processes that can be improved rather than focus on the people involved in the processes. It is data driven, and it encourages teamwork and shared ownership in the process improvement opportunity. This article describes how, by using FOCUS-PDCA, the length of stay (LOS) quality improvement (QI) team at Hubbard Regional Hospital in Webster, MA, has decreased dramatically the time patients spend awaiting nursing home placement.

Multidisciplinary team looks at the ethics of experimentation

Multidisciplinary team looks at the ethics of experimentation

Environmental modeling vs. the "chicken soup" approach: work in progress

The author wishes to note that the models discussed in this paper are all now under construction. Al though they are all being designed by the Environ mental Studies Division (ESD), there are large num bers of inputs from various other members of the research and policy community. Further, not all of the members of the ESD design team look at the models exactly as the author does. Each member of ESD's teams was chosen because of his unique point of view and the resulting models all represent a meld. Specifically, the SEAS project staff is composed of Martin Brossman, John Gerba, Sam Ratick, and Gene Tyndall; the carrying-capacity team, of Dr. Martin Redding and Robert Livingston; and so forth. Dr. Philip Patterson and I are members of each of these teams. Because the staff is small in number, there is considerable cross-fertilization in each model area. As a result, the points of view in this paper are mine to the extent that team members disagree, and are all of ours when all do agree. The reader is asked to forgive the nonrigorous and informal presentation of the models in this paper. More detailed documentation presented in a more for mal style can be obtained by writing to the author.